


Without You By My Side

by Cowboy_Sneep_Dip



Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Amnesia, Angst, Doomed Timeline(s) (Fire Emblem: Awakening), F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Hypothermia, Implied Kjelle/Cynthia, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Past Relationship(s), implied Sumia/Cordelia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:20:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22060945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cowboy_Sneep_Dip/pseuds/Cowboy_Sneep_Dip
Summary: “She doesn’t remember anything,” Lucina says quietly to Kjelle.They stand at the edge of camp, under the awning of Anna’s shop, out of the wind. Severa sits on an overturned log next to the ever-burning bonfire, a borrowed cloak from Lucina wrapped around her body and a wooden bowl in her hands. She lifts it to her lips cautiously.“Anything at all?”“Nothing,” Lucina shakes her head. “Not her name, none of us.”
Relationships: Lucina/Serena | Severa
Comments: 7
Kudos: 130





	Without You By My Side

**Author's Note:**

> (slams POST button without editing) last fic of 2019 babey!!! Lucisev time 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

They find her in the morning, when the sun glints between the dead trees and reflects off the snow. It’s be gorgeous if it weren’t for the splashes of red under the frost. 

There isn’t much beauty anymore, Lucina thinks idly, wrapping her arms around herself. When she exhales she can see her breath. It’s cold. It’s always cold, these days. 

Kjelle kneels in the snow, her heavy armor scraping and rustling as she digs through the snow with her hands. Red, and silver, and pale white skin under the snow.

“Shit,” Kjelle mutters, resting back on her ankles. She looks up and grimaces at Lucina. “It’s Severa.” 

“What?” Lucina stares at her.

There’s a sinking feeling in the pit of Lucina’s stomach that doesn’t go away, even as they work together to dig her out of the snow. She’s stiff, with flash-frozen blood crusted on her oversized silver armor. Lucina kneels opposite Kjelle and digs with her hands. The snow is hard-packed, rough and cold on her hands, but she can barely feel it.

How long had it been since she had seen Severa?

Five years? 

Ten?

The days blur together, since the sun is so seldom out. It’s dark, and cold, always. She had tried counting, when she first left the castle, but it was futile. Enough days with no sleep, or consecutive days of sleep huddled in some dark crevice, and you lose track of time completely. It doesn’t matter anymore. Time is a human invention, after all. Not many of those left to keep track. 

The sinking feeling doesn’t go away, not until Lucina pries the bloody breastplate from Severa’s chest and presses her head against her, listening, hoping, praying. She can’t hear much but the wind between the dead trees and the crunch of snow as Kjelle shifts, standing up. 

“I wouldn’t have even seen her, if it weren’t for her hair,” Kjelle remarks idly, rubbing her gloved hands together. 

Lucina shushes her.

Severa’s chest is silent. Lucina closes her eyes and breathes carefully. She mutters a prayer to Naga, something quick and delicate, and she grasps Severa’s cold, clammy hand. 

The pulse is weak, but it’s there. 

They carry Severa back to camp, Lucina supporting her legs and Kjelle supporting her shoulders and head. Her head lolls back and forth, thumping against the tarnished grey of Kjelle cold armor. By the time they get back to camp, the sun is gone again, behind clouds of ash and dust, or snow, or rain.

Rain is the worst - it’s hot and bitter and acidic, and it burns where it touches bare flesh. 

A few figures in rags huddle around a bonfire, weak and flickering in the cold. One of them looks up as they approach.

“Oh, gods, Lucina!” a slender girl with a ragged brown cloak over her silver armor dashes away from the fire towards them. 

“It’s Severa,” Lucina says gravely. “Cynthia, listen to me. You need to find Brady, tell him we need him.”

Cynthia steels herself and nods. “Okay.” 

Their camp is mostly tattered tents, set up in a semi-circle around the bonfire. On one edge - a burnt-out building, stone and charred wood and smashed windows boarded up with scavenged tatters of cart covers. Faded paint on the creaking sign - Anna’s.

Sometimes Lucina wonders if there’s any more of them around, and if so - would they be charged for using her store? It’s not like she’s using it anymore. 

They lay Severa down in the back storeroom, a makeshift infirmary consisting of little more than a few bedrolls and crates of what little medicine they have to spare. Lucina kneels at Severa’s head and checks her pulse under her neck. 

Severa’s face is snowburnt, a violent, angry red that matches the locks of hair that cascade in twisted tangles down her breastplate. Lucina pries the hinges of the armor apart fully, enough to slide it over Severa’s motionless head. 

The clothes underneath are frozen red. Lucina grimaces. 

“This is fresh,” Kjelle remarks, holding up the dented breastplate. “No more than a day, I’d guess.” 

“Can you really tell?” 

“She’s still alive, isn’t she?” 

Lucina doesn’t know what to say to that, so she stares at Kjelle. The storeroom door opens and Brady shuffles through, Cynthia in tow. 

“Severa,” Cynthia gasps a sob and kneels. “Oh, gods, Sev…”

“Give Brady some space,” Lucina says, putting a hand on her shoulder and gently pulling her back into an embrace.

The sisters had been separated when the city fell. 

“Do you think she was looking for us?” Cynthia asks. Lucina wishes she had more answers to give. 

Brady works diligently and quietly, using a rusted serving knife to cut back the clothing frozen to Severa’s body. 

“You don’t have to be here,” Kjelle says, gently taking Cynthia’s hand. “She’ll be okay. Brady knows his stuff.”

“Appreciate the vote of confidence, chief,” Brady shrugs, fumbling with a vulnerary. “Can’t say I’ve treated an ice cube before.”

Kjelle lightly thumps him on the shoulder as she passes, taking Cynthia along with her. 

Lucina sits on a crate and watches Brady work. “Risen?” she asks.

“Exposure.” 

Lucina grimaces as he peels back the thick fabric of Severa’s shirt. She’s dressed warmly, in a sweater under her tunic, but that doesn’t fix the ribs pressed against her thin, pale skin. She looks more skeleton than girl.

“She needs to warm up,” Brady says, brushing his hands. “The blood looks old, but the cold is the current problem.”

“I’ll get my tent ready,” Lucina nods.

She collects blankets from around camp, ducking in and out of other soldiers’ tents. It’s strange to call them soldier’s tents - Cynthia’s is fabric she found in a old textile mill, a colorful knit stained with weather and time. Kjelle’s tent is spartan, practical, an inherited traveling kit from the family she was staying with when Ferox fell. Lucina ducks in and picks up a thick woolen blanket. 

She tries to remember when she and Severa had last spoken. It was in Ylisstol, for sure. There was talk of fleeing the city, back then, as if there was anywhere to go. Cordelia refused outright, Lucina remembers. There was a heated argument in her father’s quarters that ended with Cordelia slamming the door and exiting into the night. Lucina was there, too, leaning against a bookcase, watching the head of the pegasus knights argue that it’s better to make a stand than to flee.

So that was it, then. Cordelia sent her daughters away, to Sumia’s parents in the countryside. Lucina must have said goodbye to her, but she can’t remember what she said. What would that be, then? Five years? No, Severa must have been too young to fight, back then. 

Brady helps carry Severa’s weak, crumpled body to Lucina’s tent and parts in peace, leaving Lucina to strip Severa’s clothes and wrap her in woolens. She tugs off her own tunic and pulls off her shirt, remembering Uncle Freddy’s Survival Training Bootcamp. Body heat, skin contact. Apparently some mages could use fire to cure hypothermia, but no one in the camp had the aptitude. Sometimes Lucina thinks of Laurent and wonders if he’s alright, off to the south. 

Lucina tugs the blankets over herself as well and huddles close with Severa. Like this she can feel the fragile bones beneath her thin, cold skin. Severa’s face is still burnt red and raw, and her lips are chapped. Dried blood cakes one corner and Lucina licks her thumb and rubs the blood from Severa’s lip.

She holds Severa close, and closes her eyes, and she prays. She runs through every prayer in her father’s books, every plea to Naga. Please. Please, any god that has any power. Not another one. Not another dead child, not another grave. Please.

Lucina buries her face against Severa’s shoulder and wraps her bare arms around her. She’s cold, and stiff, and Lucina can’t shake the feeling she’s embracing a corpse. 

-

On the second day, maybe, Severa stirs. Lucina hasn’t moved the whole time, save to sit up and eat food brought to her from outside. She listens to Severa’s heartbeat, the soft thumping that gains strength as her muscles and tissues and bones thaw. She moves, slightly, and then again, and Lucina sits up, staring with bated breath.

Thank Naga, thank any god that cares to listen. “Severa,” she breathes, reaching down to brush Severa’s tangled hair from her face.

Severa’s eyes are still shut, but she manages to murmur something. 

“Hey,” Lucina says softly, cradling her. “Hey, it’s okay.”

“Mmn,” Severa mumbles into her arm. 

Once, when they were young, Lucina and Severa skipped training to nap in the stables. Severa had been up the whole night with a horrible cough and could barely hold her training sword, so Lucina made a nest of horse-blankets and curled up with her in the loft. Lucina forces a smile and tries to pretend her eyes aren’t shining with tears. 

Severa blinks and stares up at the tent.

“Hey,” Lucina smiles, sniffling. “Hey, sleepyhead.”

“Wh…?”

“Do you know where you are?” Lucina asks, supporting her shoulders. 

Severa shakes her head. 

Lucina sits up and wraps the blankets around Severa’s bare shoulder. “You’re in a camp just outside Southtown. Why are you here?”

“I don’t...know,” Severa blinks. 

“That’s okay. Just rest, and I’ll get you some food, okay?” 

Severa nods.

Lucina slips out of the blankets and pulls her clothes on, her woolens, her tunic, her cloak, her boots. She’d been meaning to get a hood or a scarf, but they hadn’t been able to scavenge any suitable fabric. She stops at the door and kneels to buckle her boots on.

“Um…” Severa says quietly from the nest of blankets. 

“Yeah?” Lucina asks softly. 

“Who are you?” 

-

“She doesn’t remember anything,” Lucina says quietly to Kjelle. They stand at the edge of camp, under the awning of Anna’s shop, out of the wind. Severa sits on an overturned log next to the ever-burning bonfire, a borrowed cloak from Lucina wrapped around her body and a wooden bowl in her hands. She lifts it to her lips cautiously. 

“Anything at all?”

“Nothing,” Lucina shakes her head. “Not her name, none of us.”

Severa’s hands shake as she lifts the bowl to her lips, and Cynthia kneels at her side, helping her drink the warm, salty broth. Cynthia smiles and says something, but her eyes seem to pass over Severa, glancing towards Lucina and Kjelle, huddled together and casting furtive glances towards their newest refugee. 

“Have you talked to Cynthia?” 

“I thought you would.”

“Oh. Right.”

Lucina forces a hollow laugh. “I can’t imagine she’s taking it well. Her sister forgetting her can’t be easy.”

“I wonder if it’s brain damage.”

Lucina frowns up at Kjelle, who shrugs.

“I mean, she was in the cold for who-knows-how-long. One time mom told me that if you’re out too long, parts of your brain just start freezing solid.”

“Gross.”

“You know Miriel.”

Lucina laughs, and this time it’s genuine. “I’m going to go check on her.” She leaves Kjelle at the shop front and treks out towards the center of camp. It’s warm by the bonfire, warm enough that sweat beads on her forehead. Lucina smiles and sits at Severa’s side. “Hey.”

Severa sniffles and takes another cautious sip of her soup. 

Cynthia stands, nods, and leaves the two of them alone.

“How are you feeling?” 

“Okay, I think,” Severa says. 

“You can stay in my tent,” Lucina says, picking up a broken stick to prod the fire. “Uh, sorry about the, uh…”

“Waking up naked thing?”

“You were frozen solid.” 

Severa stares at her soup. “I feel sick,” she says.

It’s less a remark and more of a warning, because she drops her bowl and retches into the snow by the fire. 

Lucina pats her back and holds her gently, cooing and stroking her hair. “It’s okay,” she says. “You don’t want to eat too quickly if you haven’t had food for awhile.” Lucina props her up. “Do you know when you last had something to eat?” 

Severa shakes her head. “Sorry.” 

-

“It’s like she’s an entirely different person,” Lucina says. The three of them sit cross-legged around an oil lantern in the front of Anna’s shop. Kjelle holds Cynthia’s hand and rubs a thumb over her knuckles. 

Cynthia sniffles and wipes her eyes. “I was so scared that I lost her, and-and-”

“It’s okay,” Kjelle squeezes her hand. “She’s alright, that’s enough.” 

Cynthia shakes her head. “N-no, she’s...that’s not my sister.”

“Don’t say that,” Kjelle shakes her head. “She’s still recovering.” She looks up at Lucina. “She’s resting in your tent, right?” 

Lucina nods. “She couldn’t keep any food down, but I got her to drink some water and have a bite of bread. It’ll have to do, for now.” 

“Can Brady do anything?” Cynthia sniffles. 

“I don’t know,” Lucina admits. She stares at her hands. It’s cold in the shop. It’s always cold, though, so that’s not a surprise. “We might just have to wait and see what comes back.”

“Do you think she knows what happened to mom?” Cynthia asks. 

“I don’t know,” Lucina says again.

“She was wearing her armor,” Kjelle says. “There was a maker’s mark inside the breastplate.”

“Cordelia’s armor?” 

Kjelle nods. 

“Maybe she’s still alive,” Cynthia says, blinking back tears. “M-maybe she gave Severa her armor, and-”

“Cynthia,” Lucina looks at her. “We need you to be calm, okay?”

Cynthia nods weakly and Kjelle tugs her into a half-hug before kissing her forehead. 

“It’s okay, Cynth,” Kjelle says quietly. “We’ll figure it out.” 

Lucina stares at the oil lamp, watching the weak flame dance in its wire cage. A small bubble of heat and light emanates from it, just enough to encircle the three of them. 

-

Severa is asleep when Lucina returns to the tent, buttoning it up behind her and unclasping her cape from her shoulders. 

She sighs and tugs her tunic over her shoulders and pulls off her boots, stripping down to her woolens and pulling a warm blanket around her shoulders. 

Severa is alive, thank Naga, but something gnaws at Lucina’s stomach. A discomfort, something scratching at her inside. The thought crosses her mind that Severa is a Risen, and Lucina quickly brushes it aside. It’s impossible - she doesn’t have the mask, for one, and she’s been...well, less than feral. She hasn’t shown any aggression at all, which is...totally unlike Severa, actually. 

“Wah!” Lucina almost leaps out of her skin when she turns around. Severa is sitting up, the blankets pooling around her waist. 

Lucina laughs and shakes her head, pressing a hand to her chest. “Oh, gods, Severa, you scared the daylights out of me.”

“Sorry,” Severa bows her head, and in the dark Lucina can see that she’s blushing. 

“Were you watching me change?” 

Severa shakes her head, maybe a little too frantically to be convincing. Lucina smiles sadly and sits cross-legged at Severa’s side. 

“You feeling any better?” 

Severa shrugs. “I...I don’t know. It’s so frustrating.”

“To not remember?” 

Severa nods. “That girl...um…” she stares at the blanket.

“Cynthia?”

“She’s really, um…”

“Exuberant?” 

“What does that mean?” 

“Excitable.”

Severa cracks a grin and nods. “Is she really my sister?” 

“As far as I know,” Lucina shrugs and rests back on her hands. “Your moms were Falcon Knights at the castle.”

“The castle?”

“Ylisstol.” 

“Oh.”

“You don’t know where that is?”

Severa winces and shakes her head. “I don’t...I don’t remember anything. I mean, waking up here, and...that’s it. Everything else is just blank.”

“Would it be weird for me to tell you about yourself?” 

“Maybe.” 

Lucina laughs and fusses with the blankets before laying down. “Rest might do some good, then.”

“Does everyone share a tent?” Severa asks, nestling down next to her, “or is this special treatment?” 

“Think of it like a deluxe suite at an inn,” Lucina grins, tugging a heavy cotton blanket over them. “Most of us double-up to share body heat. It gets cold at night.” 

Severa adjusts, trying to get comfortable on Lucina’s single pillow. Lucina had offered it up to her and opted to rest her own head on the hard tent floor, the only thing between her forehead and the ground the layer of blankets underneath them. 

Severa shuffles closer. “You can, um…” she blushes. “We can share the pillow.” 

“Wow,” Lucina grins. “Maybe you  _ aren’t _ Severa.” 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” 

“Nothing,” Lucina laughs, rolling on her side and tugging Severa close. “Here, Severa - I mean, you - used to like being the little spoon.”

“I - what?!” 

Lucina laughs again, softer this time, Severa squirms back against her. 

“You don’t have to do this,” she says quietly. 

“You’re shivering.”

Severa doesn’t respond to that, but she also doesn’t protest when Lucina drapes an arm around her. It’s convenient, this sharing of body heat. Or maybe that’s just the blush creeping into her cheeks. 

“We used to do this when we were young,” Lucina says softly, her free hand combing through Severa’s hair. “You used to have these terrible nightmares, and you’d show up in my room at night, asking if you could share my bed with me.”

“That sounds made up,” Severa pouts into her pillow. Lucina’s arms are warm around her, and one wandering hand traces the thin curve of her bony hip. She doesn’t recoil at the touch. 

Lucina hums something as she combs through Severa’s hair with her other hand, something soft and kind and familiar. A feeling wells up inside Severa. Recognition, maybe, though she can’t put a name to it. It’s a song she heard long ago, in some part of her memory that remains inaccessible to her.

“What’s that song?” she asks. Lucina’s fingers are delicate on her scalp. It feels nice.

“Hm? It’s an old ballad,” Lucina says. “I think Donnel - one of my father’s knights - used to sing it. It’s about pegasus knights, I think.”

“It’s really beautiful.”

Severa isn’t sure why she starts crying, but Lucina is there to shush her, to brush the tears from her fluttering eyelashes. She curls into Lucina, gasping for breath. 

“It’s okay,” Lucina says softly. She ventures a soft kiss against Severa’s forehead.

Severa sleeps in fits and starts, wracked at points with rasping coughs and sniffles. She’s still recovering from her near-death experience, and it shows when she wakes, gasping for breath, coughing bloody phlegm onto the blanket. And each time Lucina bolts upright, woken by her pain, there to attend to her needs. To wash her face, her hands, to give her water. 

Now Severa sleeps soundly, her breathing quieted but for snores.

Lucina stares at the ceiling of their shared tent. It’s still dark outside, and she’s given up on sleep. It’s not the cold, though it is so bitterly cold that she struggles to get comfortable. Sleeping next to Severa is what keeps her awake, what keeps her heart thrumming and her stomach churning. 

She would owe Severa an explanation, before long. 

But Severa didn’t remember, and it’s it better that way? 

Guilt churns in her stomach. 

It’s hard not to feel like she’s responsible for Severa’s state. Cynthia had told her, time and time again, that it wasn’t her fault, but the regret remains. Lucina is a leader. Not just any leader - the only one left. The rallying point for the remaining Ylissean forces. The daughter of the Exalt, the prince of the dead. If she is to reject someone, where would that person go? Out into the wasteland? Into the arms of the Grimleal? 

She turns over on her side and watches Severa sleep.

Even in the dim light, she can see the tinges of red in her cheeks and around her nose, the cracked and dry lips. She stares at her lips.

How long ago would she have kissed her? 

How long ago would she have let herself be kissed? 

-

“You should tell her,” Kjelle says, resting a bow on her knees.

Lucina stands at the top of a hill, on an overturned log, staring out at the horizon. “Is now the time to discuss this?”

“We’re on patrol,” Kjelle says, stretching her arms. “Now’s a good a time as any.” 

Lucina sits at Kjelle’s side. It’s a grey and ashy day, smoke blowing in from the west. Lucina lifts her scarf to cover her face. 

“If you don’t tell her, you’re taking advantage of her.”

Lucina exhales. “You’re right, as usual.” She grimaces and looks at Kjelle. “What should I tell her?”

“That you were in love, maybe.”

“We weren’t in love.”

Kjelle snorts and laughs. “Yeah, sure.”

“Kjelle.”

“Look, you two...have some bad blood. But it’s fine. Just own up to it, and see where it goes. I just...I dunno, I don’t like the idea of you and her crashing together if you haven’t admitted to-”

“To breaking her heart.”

“In not so many words.”

Lucina sighs and rests her face in her hands. “Somehow, I thought the apocalypse would put a stop to all of these concerns.”

“Love, like hope, will never die.”

Lucina laughs and Kjelle claps her on the shoulder.

“Listen, the two of you were my best friends. I can’t take sides in this, but…give it some thought. But tell her.”

Lucina spends the remainder of the day thinking about the best way to approach the subject. She stands at the edge of the camp, fixing her gear and stacking chopped wood they had harvested from dead trees while on patrol. She kneels, ostensibly working, but her gaze is fixed on Severa, sitting at the campfire. 

She’s still too weak to spend much time on her feet, but she’s been eating, which is a relief. Lucina watches her tuck her face into her elbow and cough. 

Lucina stands and brushes wood and dust from her tunic and treks across the camp.

“This seat taken?”

Severa looks up, surprised. “No?”

Lucina sits at her side and gazes at the fire. “You feeling okay?” 

“No,” Severa sniffles. 

Lucina smiles at her and rests a hand on her leg, instinctively, before pulling back. “I, uh, wanted to talk to you about something.”

“What?” 

“I’m...sorry,” Lucina says quietly. She stares at the flickering fire, her eyes fixated on the embers at the very bottom - red-hot, glowing, caked in a crack layer of white. The fire crackles and pops. In another time, in another life, she had watched her own home reduced to the same. She remembers hands clawing their way out of the fire. She told herself it was Risen under the wreckage, but…

“For what?” 

“I…” Lucina sighs deeply. “I think we should maybe talk. About us, I mean.”

“Us.”

“Has anyone said anything to you?”

“Cynthia keeps hugging me.”

Lucina gives a hollow chuckle. “Yes, she does that. And she likely won’t stop. But, I mean, has anyone said anything about us?” 

Severa frowns at her and coughs. “You’ve been acting kinda cagey.”

“Yeah, it’s…” Lucina picks up a stick to prod the fire with. Somehow difficult conversations seem easier when you have something to do with your hands. “Well, you and I, we used to, um…”

“We were a couple.”

“We w- oh! Yeah. Do you remember that?” 

“No,” Severa shakes her head. “I have amnesia, I’m not a moron. It’s not that hard to put the pieces together.” 

Lucina nods. She doesn’t think she’s blushing, but something warms her face. The fire, probably. “Yeah, we...we were something like that.”

“Something like that?” 

“Yeah.”

The fire crackles and pops. Lucina prods some of the glowing embers with her stick. 

Something like that was right. 

“I told you we couldn’t be together, because I was the prince and you were...well, you were…”

“Nothing.”

“Yeah.”

Lucina sighs.

She hadn’t called Severa ‘nothing’, at the time, but...when Lucina was younger, there had been talk of political marriages. Arranged marriages. Diplomatic promises, nations bound by blood. It was fun to kiss your knight in the stables, but when it came to it, Lucina’s duty was to the Halidom. 

Severa had been understandably upset. She and Lucina had fought. Not just with words, but with fists, with scratching fingers and angry eyes, and it was so strange to remember a time when they had practiced play-fighting, only to use the very same tactics for real. Severa had pinned her to the dirt in the courtyard, punched her, spit in her face.

And Lucina covered her bruises in makeup and attended a royal dinner with her father. 

They hadn’t spoken since. 

Severa had left, to the north with her mother. Lucina had stayed. Ylisstol burned. 

Lucina prods the fire and watches it spark and crackle. 

Kids are stupid, huh. Lucina sits up straighter and lands herself in the present, staring at Severa’s gaunt, pale face. A pale scar traces along the curve of her chin, her nose is notched, and both of her eyes are dark and red-rimmed. She coughs and rubs her nose.

It’s foolish to think things would have been different if Severa had stayed. Odds are she would be dead, like everyone else. Most of the castle’s survivors were knights out on missions or children sent away from the city to hide. Lucina had escaped through a cracked wall in the courtyard, a desperate climb through bushes, brambles, and sheer cliff faces. 

Severa - the Severa of the present - touches Lucina’s leg. “It’s okay,” she says quietly.

“That’s how I know you aren’t really Severa,” grins Lucina, trying to be playful. “The last thing you said to me was that you hated my princely guts, and if you never saw my ugly mug again, you’d be happy.”

Severa seems taken aback by that. “Really?”

“One time you threatened to rip my cousin’s eyebrows off with a pair of pliers.”

Severa laughs. “Did he deserve it?”

“Absolutely.”

Severa’s laugh is interrupted by a hacking cough. She doubles over in pain, gasping for breath, and Lucina kneels at her side, supporting her. Severa coughs blood against her shoulder. 

“It’s okay,” Lucina says. “It’s okay. KJELLE!” she looks up and shouts over Severa’s shoulder. “Water!”

-

Lucina comes in from the cold, snow and bitter wind coming in through the crack in the tent as she slips in. 

“You’re out late,” Severa remarks, from her recovery-nest of blankets. She’s got an elixir she’s slowly sipping on. 

“You should be resting,” Lucina kneels to button up the tent. 

“I couldn’t sleep.”

Lucina takes her boots off and leaves them by the tent-flap before crawling across the floor of pillows and curling up against Severa’s blankets. She rubs the flush red from her cheeks. “Gods, it’s cold out there.” 

“Is it winter?”

Lucina shakes her head and blows in her hands to warm them up. “July.”

“What?” 

“Ever since the Fell Dragon returned, everything’s been out of sorts,” Lucina explains. “Here, let me warm my hands-” she slips a hand up Severa’s tunic and presses it against the slim flat of her stomach.

Severa squeals and recoils, swatting her. “Hey, hey, cold! Ack!” 

Lucina crawls to chase her, wrapping her arms around her and tugging her into a prone embrace. “I missed you while I was on patrol.”

“Yeah,” Severa scowls, pressing her palm to Lucina’s forehead and pushing her back. “I remembered something.”

“Oh?” Lucina sits up and smiles. “That’s great news! What do you remember?” 

“I couldn’t stop thinking about that song,” Severa says quietly, tugging her knees up to her chest. “The one you were singing the other night. It’s about Caeda, isn’t it?”

“It...is,” Lucina nods. “You’re right.”

“My mother used to sing it to us,” Severa hugs her knees tighter. “When we couldn’t sleep.”

“You and Cynthia?” 

Severa nods, her eyes fixed on the floor of the tent. “I mean, I think so. I remember sharing a room with someone, I...I guess it’s her.”

That’s something,” Lucina says. 

Outside the tent, wind howls, cold air cutting through the thin fabric and making Lucina thankful for her layers. She undoes her cloak and wraps it around Severa’s shoulders. 

“Lucina?”

“Hm?”

“Did I really say those horrible things to you?” 

Lucina furrows her brow. “I...I mean, it was...years ago. We were just stupid kids.” 

“I just...I can’t imagine being so cruel to you,” Severa says softly. Her hand pats the blanket, searching for Lucina’s. She twines their fingers together. “You’ve been so kind with me, and patient with me...even when I throw up on your blankets.” She cracks a smile. “Thank you.” 

Lucina gives her hand a comforting squeeze. “It’s nothing, really.”

“No, it’s not nothing,” Severa pulls her closer. “I mean, I’d be dead if it weren’t for you.” 

“I...I would have done it for anyone.” 

“Anyone?” Severa furrows her brow. “You’d have laid naked in a tent cradling  _ anyone’s  _ body?”

Lucina isn’t quite sure what to say to that, so she picks up Severa’s hand and presses her lips to her knuckles. “Severa, I...I don’t want to overburden you with your past, but...I loved you. And I think I still do. But we can’t...I can’t...if you don’t remember, if you don’t  _ forgive _ me, then I can’t…”

Severa kisses her.

Lucina pulls back, startled. 

Severa clasps her hands. “Lucina, I forgive you.”

“No!” Lucina protests. “You can’t say that just because you don’t remember!” 

“Lucina, before you dug me out of the snow, I didn’t know my own name. You told me my name, and now I know who I am.” She lifts Lucina’s hand to her lips and kisses the pad of her thumb. “You told me we were lovers, once, and now I know why I feel so strange and tense inside when I think about you.” 

Lucina stares at her, watches as she kisses each of her fingertips before reaching out to tug Lucina’s glove off. It inverts, knuckle by knuckle, until Severa pulls it off. She kisses Lucina’s palm. 

“Severa…”

She reaches out and pulls Lucina’s other glove off, repeating the ritual. Kissing her fingers slowly, tenderly. Her lips are rough, dry, but warm. Lucina wants so badly to kiss those lips, the lips she’s dreamt of for Naga-knows-how-long. Lucina keeps herself propped up on her elbows and Severa crawls forward to unbuckle and unfasten her tunic. She slides it off by inches until Lucina is in her woolen leggings and shirt. Severa crawls forward farther and kisses her lips. 

She tastes dry, like skin and blood, but Lucina melts into her lips and returns the gesture. 

Her body is light on Lucina’s, her bones frail and her joints cracking, and periodically she pulls back to take hacking breaths between coughs. But her lips always return, and her hands tangling in Lucina’s hair, and she pulls the blankets over both of them. Their nest is warm and safe, and Lucina kisses her harder than she ever had before. 

“I remember,” Severa says quietly, pulling back and resting her head on Lucina’s shoulder. 

“Oh?”

“You’re a lousy kisser.”

“Hey!” Lucina reaches down to try to tickle her.

“Too much tongue!” Severa says, wrestling back. “You have to build up, you can’t just stick it in there immediately!”

“Oh, like this?” Lucina says, doing it. Severa playfully bites the tip of her tongue. 

Lucina grasps Severa’s face and kisses her. “I missed you,” she says.

“I’m sure I did too.”

Lucina cradles her against herself, the warmth of their bodies like a fire between them. 

“Lucina?” Severa asks.

“Mmhm.”

“I don’t...I mean, I don’t remember, but...I think I’m looking forward to getting to know you again.”

“Oh, man,” Lucina grins, kissing her forehead. “You’re going to be SO mad when you learn about my wardrobe again.” 

“Your...oh, gods, I do remember. Something about Lady Emmeryn?!”

“Shh,” Lucina kisses her lips to hush her. “You should be resting.” 

**Author's Note:**

> As always, if you wanna say hi, I'm at @lucisevofficial.tumblr.com and @cowboy_sneep on twitter!


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